About Optics & Photonics TopicsOSA Publishing developed the Optics and Photonics Topics to help organize its diverse content more accurately by topic area. This topic browser contains over 2400 terms and is organized in a three-level hierarchy. Read more.

Topics can be refined further in the search results. The Topic facet will reveal the high-level topics associated with the articles returned in the search results.

Abstract

A bistable negative lens with a large aperture size (~10mm) by integrating a polarization switch of ferroelectric liquid crystals (FLCs) with a passively anisotropic focusing element is demonstrated. The proposed lens not only exhibits electrically tunable bistability but also fast response time of sub-milliseconds. The tunable lens power is from 0 to −1.74 Diopters. The electro-optical properties and imaging performances are demonstrated. The impact of this study is to provide a solution of electrically bistable liquid crystal lenses for the applications of portable devices, wearable devices and colored ophthalmic lenses.

Figures (5)

Operating principles and the structure of the bistable negative lens at (a) e-state and (b) o-state. The white arrow of the polarizer indicates the transmissive axis. The propagation direction of incident light is along + z direction. (c) The top view of FLC directors of the FLC layer in (a) θ = 0, and θ = 46 degree means the LC lens is at e-state and at o-state, respectively.

(a) The image of the LCPC sample placed between two crossed polarizers. (b) The measured phase profile of the LCPC sample. The color bar indicates phase difference in the unit of micron. (c) The optical phase difference as a function of position.

Image performance of the assembled sample (a) at o-state (−10V). (b) After the voltage was turned off, the image remains the one at o-state. (c) Image performance at e-state ( + 10V). (d) After the voltage was turned off, the image remains the one at e-state.